after the Los Espookys episode, "El monstruo marina"

I have wanted this kind of crypto—the machine that bobs under the water, chayote that I hate the most. The old soup of us comes through in the radio bake. I played a newscaster, pique says for hair, stem water for breasts. You carried sea moths brightly to their tombs. I have tricked us far too long, make you slide me letters on wires as I dangle low on the dock, watching the infants grow legs, monsters of us trace tell us our future, and we ignore them again.

Monique Quintana is a Xicana from Fresno, CA and the author of the novella Cenote City (Clash Books, 2019). Her short works have been nominated for Best of the Net, Best Microfiction, and the Pushcart Prize. In addition, she has been awarded artist residencies to Yaddo, The Mineral School, and Sundress Academy of the Arts. She has also received fellowships to the Community of Writers, the Open Mouth Poetry Retreat, and she was the inaugural winner of Amplify’s Megaphone Fellowship for a Writer of Color. You can find her @quintanagothic and moniquequintana.com.